Care
by BarefootJourney
Summary: A short look into how caring can pull even the most desperately damaged from the edge of death and self destruction. Nicky's thought process during her detox upon her first arrival at Litchfield. I find those scenes are never quite long enough to feel all the feels and explore what is really happening. So here's my little take on it.


A/N: This may get edited in the future, as the tenses jump around a bit, but I thought it sort of fits that state of misfiring thoughts and emotional whirlwind. If you can stick it out, I'd be happy to bake you some cookies or Claudette's famous coconut cake. Or, my personal fave: a giant fresh fruit salad.

...

I don't care. I am here and this is it. I have no one. I'm alone and there have to be drugs here. The rehab junkies told me stories. Someone has gear and I'm going to get it. If I OD, no big. Marka will probably rejoice. I'm a disgrace for being here. Hey, maybe she'll get a high off all the sympathy she will receive if I die in here.

Fuck... no where to get smack. They said one of the guards but can't trust a kibble head.

Now that the protective barrier of years of drug use and narcotic fog were breaking and falling away, the world came rushing at me. Everything hurt. Like someone put me in a giant fucking blender and not only was I being cruelly shredded, there was nothing to grab onto, no sense of direction, no way out. No eye to this storm.

I fought, but resistance was futile. Death was imminent. Death was certain. Only this time, it would not be a peacefully numb overdose.  
No, it was going to be a violently painful, gruesome, frighteningly horrific death. And I was going to be alone. But I shouldn't care... I don't care. I'm not supposed to. I've always been alone anyway. All my friends are high all the time. They don't notice when someone goes missing. If they do, it's temporary. Next fix is just seconds away.

She was right. They were all right. I was unlovable. Even clean, no one wanted me. They would help me detox, then leave. I must be defective in both realms. It is better to pretend not to care.

But the caring would be my undoing.  
Because the truth that I could never fully silence internally was that I did care. I wanted to love and be loved.

I wanted a mom.

Someone who wasn't paid to give a damn. Someone who wanted me. Someone who kissed me goodnight and made me do my homework.  
Someone who wouldn't push me away like an Ebola-ridden carcass when I had a cold or a stomachache. Someone who remembered my birthday and didn't regard it as one of the worst days of their life - as one of their biggest regrets.

I fucked up.  
I don't deserve any of that. I'm not worthy of love.

But I want it. I want it so badly it claws at my chest. It grips my throat and punches me in the gut when I think about it.

Bolts of lightning shoot out every pore of my body.  
Blind... I can't see. I don't know if my eyes are open or closed. I can't... I just can't.

I try to draw in air, but my face and lips are as immobile and unfeeling as the tile and brick surrounding me.

Vomit. Nothing I can do to stop it. I'm spinning, spiraling downward out of control.  
My flesh is being ripped from muscle. I'm drowning in black thick ooze and I have no idea if I'm hot or cold.

**********  
She was taking care of me, so gently, kindly. I'd been here before with other people and their empty platitudes and nice words.

She would be gone soon. As soon as she did her job or whatever, she would vanish from my life. She probably has to do this. It's her assigned task or community service or charity case or what fucking ever.

I let the cliche phrases ride the streams of cold sweat and roll off me. I won't even acknowledge them long enough to process their meaning. It wasn't until her tone became harsh that the voice finally penetrated my protective deflectors. Her threat extended beyond detox, it held a promise of her presence in the future.

From my world of swirling oppressive, pounding blackness, I managed to open my eyes for the briefest of moments.  
I looked at her and got a tiny reprieve from my hell. It was fleeting, but it was substantial enough that all my senses tuned into this woman before me, muffling the pain that was trying, and up until then, succeeding, in my destruction.

"Remember what I'm saying."

That emotion I'd spent years trying to kill, that "caring", was suddenly awakened, beckoned by her eyes searching mine, reaching down into the depths and finding my soul, not retreating until she had extracted it from the darkness.

It's emergence was announced with an involuntary cry escaping the raw shreds of my throat, propelling me to hug and cling to this woman and vocalise my fear.

It felt like I had finally come home. A feeling I'd never experienced in this life. Ever.

The last thing I remember is a gasp of surprise and a tightening of her embrace before the process resumed its course straight into a maelstrom of painful crushing vengeance.

I lost my consciousness to the detox, but my heart and soul had been found and were kept in the safe hands of a fiery Russian lady that spoke soothing, healing words I couldn't understand.

I no longer wanted to succumb to the beckoning death.. because the woman holding me had somehow just given me a spark of life.

She cared.


End file.
